On Day 32 of the war in Ukraine, Pope Francis made one other passionate appeal to political leaders “to know that day by day of war makes the situation worse for everybody.” He pleaded with them, “Enough! Stop the war! Silence the guns! Negotiate seriously for peace.”
He made the statement in front of hundreds of individuals, some carrying Ukrainian and Polish flags, in St. Peter’s Square on Sunday, March 27, after reciting the Angelus with them.
On the fifth Sunday of the war Francis recalled that “a month has passed for the reason that invasion of Ukraine, for the reason that starting of this cruel and senseless war, which like every war represents a defeat for everybody, for all of us.”
1000’s have been killed within the conflict, including greater than 135 children. Ten million Ukrainians—25 percent of the population of the country—have been forced to depart their homes, 3.7 million of whom are actually refugees in neighboring countries while 6.5 million individuals are internally displaced. Several cities have experienced death and destruction— within the words of Pope Francis they’ve “develop into cemeteries”—the worst of which is Mariupol where 100,000 individuals are trapped, without food, water or medical supplies, in a Russian siege that doesn’t allow humanitarian corridors for them to flee or permit the delivery of humanitarian aid.
Francis again denounced the usage of war as a way of settling conflicts between peoples. “There’s a have to reject war,” he said, adding that war is “a spot where moms and dads bury their children, where men kill their brothers without even having seen them, where the powerful ones determine, and the poor people die.”
Francis said, “War doesn’t only devastate the current but in addition the long run of a society.” He told those in St. Peter’s Square, “I even have read that for the reason that starting of the aggression on Ukraine one out of each two children has been displaced from the country. This implies to destroy the long run, to impress dramatic traumas within the smallest and most innocent ones amongst us.” He denounced this as “the bestiality of the war” and as “a barbaric and sacrilegious act.”
He repeated what he has often said before, “War can’t be something that’s inevitable. We must not get used to war.” He called on everyone “to convert the indignation of today right into a commitment for tomorrow because if we come out of this war as before we are going to in some sense be all guilty.”
Francis again denounced the usage of war as a way of settling conflicts between peoples.
President Vladimir Putin, who began this war, has also alluded to the potential for the usage of nuclear arms, and Russia is the country with the biggest variety of nuclear weapons. On the penitential service in St. Peters last Friday, March 25, Pope Francis included a prayer for the protection of the world from nuclear war. He did so within the act of consecration of Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Today, he again reminded world leaders of this when he said, “Within the face of the danger of self-destruction, let humanity understand that the time has come to abolish war, to eliminate it from the history of man before it’s the one which eliminates humankind from history.”
He urged “every political leader to reflect on this” and “to commit themselves to this” elimination of war.
He called on the world’s political leaders to “take a look at the martyred Ukraine” and “to know that day by day of war makes the situation worse for everybody.”
He invited everyone to “pray again without ceasing to the Queen of Peace, to whom we consecrated humanity, and particularly Russia and Ukraine” for an end to the war in Ukraine.
